STOP CALLING RACE BIKES ROAD BIKES

As you might guess, I spend a lot of time thinking about all kinds of bikes, from enduro e-bikes to fitness bikes and everything in between. It’s my job to understand the differences between a great $300 single speed and a bad one, and what makes a $10,000 triathlon bike merely okay or exceptional. It is my responsibility to understand what you want and need from a bicycle.

- MATT PHILLIPS

But because my experiences with bikes are my own and not yours, I spend a lot of time talking to riders I meet in the real world—and also looking at their bikes. I’m less interested in brand-new, off-the-shelf bicycles; I want to learn more about why riders adjust and modify their bikes the way they do. As a result of all this thinking and talking and looking, I recently had a head-slapping moment: I’ve been categorizing road bikes incorrectly. And many brands, shops, and riders do as well.

What we so often call road bikes—like the Specialized Tarmac, Trek Émonda, Cannondale SuperSix EVO, Cervélo R5— aren’t road bikes. They are race bikes.

These bikes are honed to go very fast on nearly perfect paved surfaces. They’re designed for use by talented athletes who are attended to by a team of mechanics and a caravan of support vehicles. Calling them road bikes makes them seem more inclusive than they are. They’re not versatile, nor are they adaptable. That’s because they’re built for use in competition in very controlled and specific circumstances. That pursuit of focused performance is why you get things like integrated front ends, proprietary parts, and aerodynamic shaping. The nonstandard parts and quick handling make perfect sense for their intended purpose. But proprietary parts and highly integrated designs also make race bikes high-strung and more difficult to live with day-to-day for average riders like you and me.